FoonLudum Dare ExplorerLD46 → Keep it Alive, Keep them Alive

Keep it Alive, Keep them Alive

By jeremyfa

View on ldjam.com

CategoryRankScoreCount
Overall943.9449
Fun733.9649
Innovation1383.8749
Theme8383.2549
Graphics4253.5849
Audio1213.7746
Humor7602.2142
Mood3603.4148

Comments

andidebob 2020-04-20 08:11

A really cool puzzle game, and I too wish you would have had the time to make more levels. I love that you can take away the commands and re-place them. Really well done.

strupf 2020-04-20 11:02

Neat little game with great potential! Love your game.

Some thoughts: Some levels are a bit stressful when you have to replace the commands while simultaneously figuring out the numbers and commands of the level. Placing visible commands (e.g. arrows) instead of numbers would be helpful imo. I would also like to have more time in the beginning and hit a "Go"-button once I'm done with placing the initial numbers.

zondarg 2020-04-20 11:18

Very nice and original concept! Cool puzzle game, played through to after level 8 - I wished there were more levels.. I liked the fitting and minimalist graphics, also the progression was well executed and made it easy to follow the increasing difficulty. Great work!

webox 2020-04-20 13:16

I wasn't able to play, pressing 1 does nothing (Chrome browser osx). Does it have to be 1 on the numeric pad?? I don't have one..

wet-band-aid 2020-04-20 13:18

Wow. This little concept is amazing. I really hope this gets made into a full game. I want to see all the different mechanics blend together in large puzzles.

jeremyfa 2020-04-20 13:18

@strupf Yes, I actually though about making graphics for the commands, but the graphic need to work on every direction. It's not like an "arrow going down" like in Chuchu Rocket. But I agree, will need to think about how to make it more readable in a "post-ldjam" version :)

quinn-patrick 2020-04-20 13:18

This one was really fun with tons of room for expansion. Some of the late levels were very challenging and got my brain hurting! Nice work!

ioan-pop 2020-04-20 13:18

Very clean design, I could definitely see this as a successful mobile puzzle game :) I think 8 levels was plenty for the time given and it gave a good taste of the game!

cagibi 2020-04-20 13:19

The puzzle mechanic is great. I agree with the idea of replacing numbers with arrows.

kittennation 2020-04-20 13:19

A very good surprise ! I love your game ! I hope you'll add more levels ! Just, add a checkbox to be able to stop the music.

And maybe a "Go" button or a Countdown, sometimes we can't do something and be forced to retry again and again and again xD

So Good Job !!!

jeremyfa 2020-04-20 13:21

@webox You need to use the mouse, and click on the map ground and it will put the command 1, then command 2 etc...

refsa 2020-04-20 13:24

I liked this puzzle game. The art style is simple yet aesthetically pleasing. There is strategy involved through the whole thing since you can move the commands around. This also makes certain situations a bit more hectic and doesn't just require the initial setup. You got lots of room for more levels and ideas, so this is a great starting point for a deeper puzzle game.

You could have explained the controls a bit more. Since the commands are numbered it seems they have to be placed in order but you can also move them around. The numbering also logically connects them to the numbers on the keyboard so it was a bit confusing on the first level.

Good work!

webox 2020-04-20 13:31

@jeremyfa ohhhh now I got ir, was there a tutorial I didn't see?? I playe it through level 8 now. Great job!! It's really relaxing, do more levels!! Maybe a mobile version can work! It's really one-hand playable!

blackgoku36 2020-04-20 13:33

Nice simple puzzle game! Love the minimal graphics!

team-prosit 2020-04-20 13:43

Good game, I like puzzles and this have potential. Probably people not familiar with this genre will have troubles understanding that it's possible to take some "rules" that you have already placed in order to finish the level, I'd make it clear maybe with a hint or a tutorial.

jeremyfa 2020-04-20 13:55

@team-prosit There is actually a tip in some levels when you lose :) But maybe it should be even more clearer!

saviqq 2020-04-20 13:57

Wow this is amazing! Dude I finished you game and I see so much potential for it, I hope you gonna continue working on it. Here are my notes:

**Thing I like** - overall concept and idea is amazing - music adds up atmosphere to the game - mechanics and level design

**Things that could be improved** - Consider option that you can first lay out your movemnt objects and then start the level, it opens up to create beautiful levels and removes click intensive/stressful replacing of tiles - better animation for jumping (maybe instead of jumping some "bridge" will be created

Overall amazing work in 48 hours

team-prosit 2020-04-20 13:58

@jeremyfa Ah ok, I didn't loose, that's why ;)

goffmog 2020-04-20 22:11

Oh man this is incredible. I'm always in awe of original puzzle games made during LD, it's the surest way to get a high rating out of me, especially when there's so much content and the presentation is tight. Music is lovely too.

noxbuds 2020-04-21 11:06

Very good job. I like the simple art style and relaxing music. The simple puzzle system very quickly gets a lot more complicated and interesting, and it does so at a good pace

kynantokoro 2020-04-21 13:38

I really enjoyed it! maybe the best one so far.

oddarock 2020-04-21 13:41

This game has very beautiful graphics and music. Perhaps it would be better if when you lose you return to the start position and pause. Some trails left by the objects could be nice as well. The stamp reuse can lead to very complex levels. Well done !

ellenary 2020-04-21 13:43

I have a huge soft spot for puzzle games. This one is great because of its simplicity and ease of play. It was so easy to just pick it up and have one. I thought that the mechanics really encouraged trying things out. Puzzle 8 in particular is coming to mind, where you have multiple turns to make but only 1 turn square you can use. At first I thought it was a little annoying, but then I really thought about it and honestly that's the point of puzzle games. It'd be no fun if all of the mechanics were explained outright since there'd be no thinking or exploring. Excellent job in 2 days!

jeremyfa 2020-04-21 14:09

@oddarock I agree, it would be a better idea to see the begin setup of the puzzle when we lose. That's definitely an improvement to do in a post-ldjam version!

@ellenary Yes, it's not easy to find the right level of guidance in the game. I chose to display a tip in some levels when we lose them so that it gives a chance to the player to find out by himself on a first try :)

daltonleavey 2020-04-22 16:56

I like it a lot! All it's missing is more levels. Very chill and relaxing. Great stuff!

01010111 2020-04-23 14:50

Loved this! I really dig puzzles like this and had a lot of fun working that last level out :thumbsup:

I'd love to see how this evolves if you develop it further!

jeremyfa 2020-04-23 16:19

@01010111 There are so many things I didn't have the time to try during these 48h, so yes, really eager to dig deeper with the concept and see where it goes :)

frank-gevaerts 2020-04-23 19:01

I enjoyed this one. At the end it got too fast for me though, my mouse coordination isn't as good as I'd like! I like the music and audio, and the minimalist graphics are perfect for this sort of game. Personally I'd like a bit more focus on thinking and less on speed, but that's a matter of what you want the game to be, not of what's "best".

kiguel182 2020-04-23 21:06

Loved it. Great aesthetic and gameplay concept. Challenging but very smart.

Music was really good as well. Congrats, great game.

lythom 2020-04-24 21:42

Simple and efficient, both for the game design and the visual, which makes the game very harmonious. Great job !

g12345 2020-04-27 15:20

This was a lot of fun! The last level was hard enough. You could probably build on it if you want.

celia14 2020-04-28 01:35

This is a fun game, I could definitely see expanding this with further levels as interesting as the last one! I thought it kept it interesting that both the order of the commands as well and the default behavior of the fellows changed per level. I can imagine communicating that with different colors - red always goes straight, green prefers to turn left, etc.

jeremyfa 2020-04-28 08:23

@celia14 Thanks! The colors are already used to define targets: red needs to go to red goal, green to green goal etc... it could be an option to associate one behaviour with one color, but that means colors would have multiple meanings that overlap each other, but why not?

aurel300 2020-04-28 18:36

Lovely aesthetics!

I agree partly with @celia14 – it might be good to indicate more clearly what the behaviour of the … rectangles? will be in the level. I knew that it said in the top left, but I also assumed that a red rectangle will always keep going forward, so I was briefly confused when I encountered the level that looked exactly the same as a previous one, but had a different behaviour.

The mechanic of picking up an instruction after it was placed could make the game a lot different (turn it from a puzzle game into a puzzle+reaction game), but it seems to have been used only in the one level.

Great music, very nice minimalist graphics and UI, nice puzzles but I would wish there were more levels.

jeremyfa 2020-04-28 20:29

@aurel300 Thanks for the feedback! Indeed I didn't have time to exploit much of picking up instructions to reuse them, as well as a couple of other ideas I didn't expand yet. I will work on a more complete version in the future anyway, with way more levels and polish than what could be done within the 48h compo time frame!

geckoo1337 2020-04-30 13:44

Good idea - great puzzle game with a simple but clever gameplay. The minimalist aesthetic and mechanics fit with the theme. Logical is intuitive. A good vibe with this music is shared here. I had fun playing. Well done ++

ellian 2020-05-12 17:18

That was really cool! Love that every "character" had their own behaviors, and that you had to place instructions always in order. Realising how timing is important in the last two level made me think that it could make for a really interesting game if you pushed it deeper; actually waiting for the right moment to place instructions down... I wish there'd been more to it! But thanks for making it, I had a great time~